China

I don’t know anyone who hasn’t heard of China – whether in addition to the fact that 1/6 of the world’s population lives there, whether because of the goods we use every day and they seem to come mainly from China or because in 2020 there was talk every day about the Covid 19 pandemic, which started in this country. In addition, China’s share of world GDP has increased almost sixfold from 2000 to 2019 and will continue to grow as the country is expected to overtake the United States in 2028. The modern Chinese economy is the fruit of a policy of reform and openness. It is a long-term and strategic program of economic reform undertaken in the People’s Republic of China, aimed at creating so-called socialism with Chinese characteristics and a socialist market economy by opening the PRC to the outside world.

I will not bother you with the Chinese economic miracle, the socialist regime or what is sold and eaten in the Wuhan market… I will try to dig up strange and interesting facts about China such as that all pandas on Earth belong to China. About 300 animals of this species live in zoos around the world, and over 1,500 in the wild. Every time a baby panda is born somewhere in the world, which is rare, it must be sent to China to expand the genetic fund of the species. This tradition is part of an agreement reached during the Cold War, which is still in force today, and the pandas are transported by FedEx. Although they care for pandas, the Chinese do not treat other animals in a similar way, especially cats and dogs. China is a terrible place for a cat. These are animals that often fall into the plates of the locals. But eating them is far from the worst of the whole process compared to the way they have been treated before. The animals are kept in terrible conditions and are often skinned, boiled or baked alive. The same goes for dogs. 🙁

The industrial boom has a price, the highest being the ecological one. The air in Beijing is extremely polluted. In fact, breathing in this city is equivalent to smoking 21 cigarettes a day. The problem is so great that smoking in China can actually mean that you have reduced your risk of developing respiratory diseases. Due to the huge population, the scale in China has changed greatly. For example, the city of Anshan, Liaoning Province, has about 4 million inhabitants. But this is a small village according to their understanding. It sounds crazy to us – you walk along the main street and skyscrapers all around you, but in fact they tell you that you are in a village. With over a billion inhabitants, China is naturally at the top of the list of countries with the worst traffic. The longest traffic jam in history lasted 12 days, with a length of 99.7 km. The cars traveled less than 1.6 km a day. Their passengers slept on the sidewalks or had fun playing cards. Now someone dares to complain about 20 minutes of hanging on “Tsarigradsko” 😀 To regulate population growth is prohibited by law to have more than one child. Indeed, this only applies to large cities – there is no control in the villages. If you have one child, everything is OK, two – you pay tax, for three children the tax increases exponentially. You may even end up with forced sterilization.

In China, there are so-called “Nine wolves” – the most respected professions. Among them are the military, teachers, doctors, officials and the police. They all have very high salaries and are highly respected in society. Probably because of the death penalty, these professions are so respected (especially the police and officials). Corruption, arms and drug trafficking is punishable by death without appeal, you lie on the carpet in the town square and you are shot in the back of the head. On the other hand, if you have money in China, you can get out of jail by having someone else take your place. Chinese aristocrats pay poorer people to “take their place” after they are convicted of a crime. The practice is so common that it even has a name: ding zui, which literally means “deputy criminal.” Obviously, they can replace you for lesser crimes for which are not shot you .

China is a completely energy-dependent country. In this connection, there is no central supply of hot water, heating, etc. If you have money, you use a water heater and electric stoves. If you do not have – you have the choice to save yourself as you can! No democracy and no game of solidarity. No choice. There is the CCP (Communist Party of China) and nothing else. There is a Secretary General and that’s it. Who doesn’t like it – shooting. Crimes against the government are treated as harshly as possible. Discussing policy is highly undesirable. Even if you are a foreigner, you should be extremely happy if you only get away with deportation. But the Chinese are happy with the government. Totally! I saw something similar in Cuba, and I remember what it was like in Bulgaria before 1989. About half of China’s population is illiterate. But this is a huge success – in the middle of the twentieth century, 90% of the population was illiterate. The pace of life is very fast. Everyone is working like crazy, new homes are growing like mushrooms after rain, new roads are being built, everything is being reconstructed. Whether literate or not, there are simply no lazy Chinese – everyone is at work at 6 o’clock in the morning. 😮

Google is not banned, although it often disappears. Facebook, Twitter, Youtube, all kinds of porn sites are blocked by the so-called Great Chinese FireWALL. Well, proxies can be used for this purpose. The Chinese segment of the Internet is virtually isolated from the outside world. They have everything – theirs, instead of Google – baidu.com, instead of Facebook – renren.com, instead of eBay – taobao.com. China also has the largest number of Internet users – quite naturally. The Internet here is charged not for traffic, but for time. The speed is one – 5 Mbit / s download and 1 Mbit / s upload. The banking system is also practically separated from the outside world. To find an ATM that works with VISA cards, you will have to sweat a lot. Here they have their own system – Unionpay. There are such ATMs on every corner.

Getting married in China is very important. Especially for women. If you are a woman in your late 20’s in China and not yet married, you are known as Sheng Nu, which literally translates as “backward woman.” Local girls are infinitely cowardly. And chaste – concepts such as “sex for one night” or a simple “one-time meeting with a man” do not pass here. It takes a long, long relationship before something happens.

Did you know that Chinese soldiers have a pin on each side of their shirt collars? Sharp pins protect them from bowing their heads or even falling asleep from exhaustion. Soldiers are often given a wooden cross, which they must press between their shoulders to maintain a perfect posture. Given the country’s vast population, Chinese military personnel have a wide choice and only men of perfect height become soldiers.

The main food is rice, of course. The most common is rice with a huge amount of spices and additives. This is actually what everyone eats. Many Chinese do not use rice sticks – they use spoons. However, there are no forks. All food is such that it requires either chopsticks or spoons. Culinary art is also enriched by material and cultural development. Liji’s “Eight Culinary Treasures” (Label Book) can be considered the first cookbook in China. Even then, in the Josh era, ie. more than 2,700 years ago, recipes were quite complex, for example, eight surgeries were needed to prepare a roast suckling pig. Through the transmission and development of the ancient art of cooking, the original national Chinese cuisine was gradually created. Chinese dishes are famous for their beauty in color selection and exterior design, with exquisite, unique taste, aroma and variety. There is hardly a big city in the world that does not have a Chinese restaurant and that is not visited and loved. The interesting thing about their cooking performances is that nothing in Chinese cuisine is cooked for a long time – everything goes through heat treatment, but stays somehow fresh. This is the main skill. Chinese cuisine is divided into regions – eight different regions in which dishes are prepared differently. There are always 2 ingredients in their dishes – zhǔsh and cài. The main food is the exact translation of zhǔsh – that is, products such as rice, small toast, noodles, etc. Sai is the other main participant in Chinese specialties – these are all products that carry animal protein or are vegetable. Everything in Chinese cuisine is in small bites so that they can be taken more easily and conveniently with chopsticks. Soup in Chinese cuisine is the last dish to be served. It is placed in tiny porcelain bowls. If you salt your dish, it is an insult to the one who made it. The chef’s task is to serve it well enough flavored. In case the tablecloth is dirty – do not worry, this shows, according to the Chinese, that everything was really tasty. The meat they prefer is pork – the Chinese believe that it is more fragrant and easier to digest by the body (compared to beef). Chicken is also often used, it is prepared mostly with vegetables. The most valuable of the spices in Chinese cuisine is soy sauce – it and rice are completely trademarks of Chinese cuisine. Spices that are revered are cloves, cinnamon and ginger.

In traditional Chinese cuisine, it is widely believed that cold drinks are harmful to the digestion of hot food. For this reason, the only drinks that are served are hot tea or hot water. However, nowadays soft drinks and beer are a very popular part of the diet and are available in almost all Chinese restaurants. China was the first country to cultivate the tea bush, and drinking tea is an important part of people’s lives. Chinese tea is classified into several categories depending on the variety of tea bush, the region in which it is grown, as well as the method of production. China is the largest producer of green tea in the world, meeting 90% of the needs of the international market. The high-quality Matcha green tea has a centuries-old history and, in addition to the exquisite Japanese tea ceremonies, has found wide application in cooking. But this tea is Chinese, as more than 800 years ago a Buddhist monk imported it into Japan from China and planted it. Literally translated, Matcha means “tea powder”. In the period about 20 days before harvest, the leaves are shaded, thus the plant accumulates a lot of chlorophyll and retains its unique nutrients. It has been proven that no other green tea has such active substances for the human body. Once the tea leaves are collected, they are dried and ground to a very fine powder. The technology has been preserved for centuries, grinding is only by hand with heavy granite stones. This, along with its unique qualities lead to its high price, but it is worth it. Yellow wine has been known since ancient times in China, where the unique drink is made from rice and has an alcohol content of between 10 and 15%. Chinese liqueur is made from wheat, corn and rice and has an alcohol content of about 60%. It is believed to have been produced since the Song Dynasty (960-1279). In general, Chinese food outside of China is more or less adapted to local tastes, and in some cases to the point that in certain parts of the world, dishes are offered that are not available in China.

Despite the rich Chinese cuisine, cakes are not their priority and passion. 🙂 I found some pseudo cooked rice cakes, but I couldn’t imagine what they would taste like and decided to make a cake that uses a popular ingredient from China but is not traditional for the country. You will forgive me, I hope, for the arbitrariness, but I wanted a delicious and real cake in early 2021. I made a cheesecake with the match. 🙂 Here are the products needed for it:

for the cake base:

100 grams of melted butter

50 grams of melted dark chocolate

200 grams of biscuits or crackers of your choice

for cream:

18 grams of gelatin

200 grams of cream cheese

400 grams of ricotta or cottage cheese

juice and peel of a lime

120 grams of sugar (you can increase the amount to 200 grams)

vanilla

2 tablespoons matcha tea

500 ml cream

frozen fruit on request

matcha tea for sprinkling

Steps of preparation:

Melt the butter and dark chocolate. Grind the biscuits in a blender and mix all the ingredients. Put baking paper in a tray, pour the mixture and with the help of a spoon flatten and shape the base of the cake. Allow to cool while you make the cream.

Soak gelatin in 50 ml of cold water until it swells. Beat the ricotta with the cream cheese, sugar, vanilla, lime juice and zest. Separately, whip the cream until fluffy and mix everything. Melt the gelatin in a water bath or microwave. Add it and mix well. Divide the mixture and add the match tea to one part.

Place acetate foil on the sides of the cake pan. Pour the green cream over the base and smooth well.

Pour the rest of the cream. Place the blackberries. In the original recipe, it is 250 grams. I put much less because we don’t like their seeds.

Flatten well and let cool for a few hours.

Carefully remove the ring and acetate foil from the board. Gently remove the baking paper as you transfer the cake to a serving plate.

Sprinkle some matcha tea and the cake is ready. Easy and simple.

I want to go to China because I know it’s another world. So different from ours, so colorful and delicious. When the world becomes hospitable I will go there. I’m sure. I just hope it’s soon. 🙂 Now I will make tea and eat cake, and I wish you a delicious evening and see you soon.

Next destination – Cocos Islands.